The Memory of Snow

words :: Ned Morgan

I remember when winter was unremarkable.

In my childhood, Georgian Bay froze solid year after year, high snowbanks lined every roadway and I recall just one green Christmas— and that was remarkable. I recognize that memory is unreliable, but I’m not alone in believing that snow used to be more abundant.

A recent study in the journal Nature found that snowpack—the multiple layers of snow accumulated over the winter months—has declined dramatically since the winter of 1981 (when I was 10 years old). According to the study that compared datasets in the month of March throughout North America, snowpack fell by seven per cent per decade between 1981 and 2020 in the Great Lakes region.

That’s a cumulative loss of 28 per cent. I’m shocked by the number but I can’t do much with the knowledge (apart from watching my optimism wither on the vine). But do I need a research paper to tell me there’s less snow than there used to be? Personal observation over the last 15 or so years—give or take a few polar-vortex cold spells—leads me to that conclusion.

For snow people, last winter was a merciless hit job on optimism. In recent years most Ontarians have become accustomed to not skiing much in December, as the month has stayed largely green. But last winter, even January was snow-challenged—though some local resorts pulled off small miracles of snowmaking and remained open for the season, albeit with severely limited terrain. And except for a handful of decent weeks, the backcountry was a sloppy graveyard for hope and ski bases.

Those who deny all the scientific and observational evidence that the earth is warming should consider the Neanderthals. Our hominid ancestors, who disappeared roughly 40,000 years ago, presumably didn’t understand they were slowly but surely going extinct (according to some theories, because they failed to adapt to ancient climate change). If they’d had a clue—if enough of them said, “Hold on. Something’s going wrong here… but we have options!”— maybe they would still be around today.

Aging is a sustained readjustment to the previously unthinkable. When I was young I never imagined that winters wouldn’t continue to deliver the cold goods into eternity. But in the 21st century, in much of the temperate region of North America, a month and a half of consistently dry, plentiful snow feels like a windfall, an occasion for gratitude. I’m old enough to remember a time when nobody was thankful for snow. It was just the medium we existed in for four months each year.

If snow isn’t guaranteed anymore, we need an enhanced perspective to help us through the protracted freeze-and-melt cycles. The Norwegian concept of friluftsliv—embracing the outdoors in winter as a time for redoubled activity and connection—falls a little flat when winter isn’t cold enough. Perhaps a new form of adaptability is key to our salvation. When we can’t ski our favourite backcountry trails, we can at least run them with shoe spikes and trekking poles. When snow does fall, we need to stay out longer, wringing the friluftsliv out of every last snowflake.

I’m old enough to remember a time when nobody was thankful for snow. It was just the medium we existed in for four months each year.

As a youngster in the snowy ‘70s and ‘80s, my friends and I always stayed out longer. I plan to recapture that oversupply of friluftsliv, even when confronted by an undersupply of the essential raw material.

The sight of a freshly snowbound landscape will always transport me back to long childhood days on skis or toboggans, when bliss was ironclad and freezing to the touch. This winter, a childlike sense of wonder and anticipation will be on tap—no matter the forecast.